


Uprising

by Vanilla_Owns_Chocolate



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/F, bismuth sweetie i'm so sorry, rose is a SNAKE
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 14:51:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,757
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14792582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vanilla_Owns_Chocolate/pseuds/Vanilla_Owns_Chocolate
Summary: Bismuth, her thoughts on the Diamonds, and her relationship with Rose Quartz, ultimately leading up to the conception of the Breaking Point.





	Uprising

Bismuth knew very little about the Diamonds. Most Gems didn't; even the highest-ranking elites only know them on a surface level. They were leaders, and they had to maintain an illusion of nothing but the utmost confidence, intelligence, and poise.

She did know enough about them, however, to know that she hated them all.

Yellow Diamond's court was where most Bismuths came from. What with her being in charge of technical innovations and construction, it made sense that she was the one who created her Gem cut in the first place. Bismuth supposed she should have been grateful, but it was honestly hard to give thanks to someone who created you just to do their dirty work. Indeed, Yellow represented some of the Diamond Authority's most reprehensible qualities: an indifference to life itself, and the value of machines over the Gems that built them.

Blue Diamond was an insufferable snob. She had heard firsthand from Garnet. Behind her mysterious, cool façade, she was a cold-hearted, unfeeling wench. She didn't care about love or friendship or anything out of the "norm" that she had gone to great pains to establish. Well, what was wrong with going against the grain? Why did SHE get to sit there, all high and mighty on her comfortable little throne, giving orders and doing whatever she wanted while other Gems suffered? What made her so special?

White Diamond was...something else. Out of all of the Diamonds, White seemed to be the most enigmatic and mysterious of all. While Yellow, Blue, and Pink often mixed their courts together when there was a new planet to colonize, White tended to stay out of their business. Nobody had ever even seen a Gem belonging to White Diamond, and there weren't any in the Crystal Gems either. Well, that was fine by Bismuth. The less Diamonds in her life, the better.

Now, Pink Diamond...stars, Bismuth hated Pink Diamond.

While most Bismuths came from Yellow's court, there were a select few that were made to serve other Diamonds. After all, Yellow wasn't the only one who required architects. This was where Bismuth herself came in; she was temporarily reassigned, along with several others of her kind, to help out in the colonization of Earth under Pink Diamond's command.

At first, working for Pink wasn't so different from working for Yellow. Build this, build that, demolish this. That was her routine, and that was what she was used to after at least 500 years of doing the same thing over and over on different planets.

Then, she met Rose Quartz, and oh man, she started to really despise Pink Diamond.

Nobody knew for certain where Rose came from. She claimed that she hailed from the Prime Kindergarten, but Bismuth had heard her fair share of rumors, and she had to admit it was a rare sight to see a Quartz with so many curls in her hair. But hey, she didn't know enough about kindergartening to judge.

Nevertheless, after she met Rose, her eyes felt like they had been pried open to the ugly truth of the Diamond Authority. Rose showed her how incredible life on Earth could be, and all the potential it had as a habitat rather than a colony. Pink Diamond was cruel, she said, to force Gems to ruin such a beautiful planet.

But the real kicker was when she asked the question.

"What do you want to build?" she had inquired, hand extended in a gesture of solidarity. And just like that, Bismuth felt a tug in her heart, a tug that propelled her toward her own path as opposed to the one that the Diamonds had tried to cut out for her.

What did she want to build? There were so many possibilities. It took a while for Bismuth to really step outside her comfort zone and start experimenting with different forms of craftsmanship. She would have been content with just building bases for the Crystal Gems, honestly, but something pushed her to try new things. It wasn't until she truly realized her passion for weaponry that she figured out what it was: spite. Spite against the Diamonds, spite against Homeworld, spite against every single Quartz soldier or Agate who shattered her beloved friends, her family. Spite was what motivated her, and spite was what drove her to make weapons.

It was fortunate, really, that Bismuths were fireproof. Such abilities came in handy for a blacksmith such as herself, especially when her workshop was at the base of a volcano. She carved it out herself, spending days upon painstaking days making sure that the area was spacious enough, that the measurements were correct, that the ceiling and walls were strong enough to avoid giving out and flooding the place with lava.

The Forge was her quiet place. Many Gems came to her every day with a request for a new weapon or modifications to their own, and she obliged. However, when the days lolled by with little to no Gems visiting her, she got to think.

Most of the time, her thoughts always went back to Rose Quartz. She couldn't help it; she had changed her life in such a profound way that practically every memory she had lead her on a train of thought that lead her back to Rose. She couldn't think about her life on Homeworld without remembering how Rose had freed her from it, she couldn't think about her fellow teammates without imagining the fearless leader who found new roles for all of them to play, and she couldn't think about the Forge- her beautiful, wonderful forge -without realizing that it wouldn't exist if it wasn't for Rose.

The more she loved Rose, the more she hated Pink Diamond. The other Diamonds were awful, obviously, but every time she was sent out to battle hordes upon hordes of Quartzes and Agates with the Pink Diamond insignia on their uniforms, the more she began to associate her with the enemy. All Diamonds were the enemy, but Pink Diamond was THEIR enemy, HER enemy. She was the reason the Earth was in danger. She was the reason Rose Quartz had decided to rebel.

It wasn't long after making that connection that Bismuth had a brilliant idea. She began forging a sword for Rose; a special sword that would be able to disintegrate a Gem's physical form as soon as the blade made contact. It took her forever, but she wanted to make sure that the blade was pink. She had crafted it out of gold (as in, the organic gold that seemed to grow in the Earth's crust, not the Gold that served as a field medic), mixing it with copper to create what she liked to call a rose gold material. It took a long time, but she was extremely satisfied with the results.

Rose seemed to love it as well. She practically squealed with delight when she was presented with the beautiful weapon, clapping her hands and eagerly reaching out to take it. Bismuth chuckled; this was one of those rare moments when Rose dropped her caring, motherly persona and began acting rather like a child. It was adorable to her.

That sword would end up saving their asses in multiple battles. As it turned out, the ability to instantly poof a Gem came in handy. Bismuth was many things, but she was certainly not modest, and she was proud to admit that the sword was perhaps her finest piece of work by far. She congratulated herself on creating such a masterpiece.

But then, Rose began to ask questions. This was a bit odd to Bismuth, as she knew from personal experience as well as the experiences of others that Rose was never an inquisitive person, at least toward her fellow Gems. With humans, she was always asking questions about how they lived, but she staunchly refused to ask or even answer questions posed to her by her teammates. Naturally, Bismuth was kind of annoyed by this, but she didn't dare to admit it out of the sheer respect, love, and admiration that she held for their fearless leader.

Nevertheless, the questions persisted. Rose was fascinated by the sword's power, particularly its ability to poof Gems. Bismuth knew better than to ask Rose about it, considering her nature, but she found herself oddly hesitant to answer the questions, especially when Rose said, "Can it shatter a Gem?"

Bismuth blinked, taken aback. Truth be told, she hadn't thought of that before. Yes, she had intended for the sword to be powerful, but only in the event of a fair fight. After all, Rose had said time and time again that every Gem deserved a second chance, even if Bismuth didn't agree with her. She had designed the sword with that thought process in mind; the thought that maybe, by shattering as few Gems as possible, they could convince them to join their side.

"No," Bismuth said hesitantly, "it can't shatter them. It can only disintegrate their forms."

Rose brightened, and for a moment Bismuth forgot about her suspicion and let the warmth of that full-lipped smile lift her heart. She loved Rose's smile. Sometimes, she could swear she could see actual stars in her eyes.

And then Rose thanked her and left, leaving Bismuth to her thoughts.

...Huh. That was strange. But Rose often went about things in a strange way, often not informing her comrades of her plans until the last minute. While one would assume that such a strategy would lead to a lack of cohesion, Rose was always easy to read when she was in battle, making it easy to follow along. She knew what she was doing. Bismuth pushed the reflections out of her mind.

Days went by, and the war got worse and worse. The more they fought, the more Bismuth began to realize the vast difference between the number of dead Homeworld soldiers and dead Crystal Gems. Most Homeworld soldiers were shattered out of sheer desperation, as some tended to reform faster than others and prove to be an enormous pain. Rose tended to bubble these Gems, but some weren't so merciful. Bismuth couldn't blame them. She would probably do the same in their position. Besides, those Homeworld bastards had it coming.

Thoughts of shattering began to cloud her mind ever since that meeting with Rose. The more she fought, the more friends she lost, the more prevalent the fear of death became to her. The real kicker was when an enemy Amethyst tackled poor, sweet Gold from behind and began beating her relentlessly. She poofed her, crushing her gem in her hand as soon as she was incapacitated.

Bismuth didn't find out about this incident until after the battle, when they were all recuperating at the base. Rose was having trouble healing everybody, and the other medics were overwhelmed. Upon asking where Gold was, a small group of warriors in the corner went silent before a Snowflake Obsidian muttered, "Gold is dead."

Everybody went silent. The other soldiers in the group, a Biggs Jasper and a Crazy Lace Agate, seemed to be fighting back tears. Snowflake reached out and grabbed each of their hands reassuringly, her expression matching theirs.

For a while, everyone in the room stayed like that, bowing their heads out of respect for their fallen colleagues. Bismuth joined them in their mourning, but found that instead of sadness, a wave of rage was coursing through her body. If she had any blood, it would have been boiling.

Then, to her surprise, she found herself saying, "How?"

Every head in the room turned to her, then to the group of three. They all seemed incredibly reluctant to answer, but Bismuth stood up, eyes narrowing into a scowl. "How did they kill her?"

Biggs cleared her throat, pointedly looking down at the floor. "I was wounded. She tried to heal me, but an Amethyst pounced on her from behind."

"We heard her call for help and ran over to help her," Crazy Lace chimed in, her usual smile gone, "but by then it was too late. We found her shards on the ground."

"And what happened to the Amethyst?" Bismuth didn't know where these words were coming from, but she was saying them with a fierce determination that didn't match her typical carefree nature. Her expression was devoid of all humor.

"I…" Biggs swallowed, her hefty form trembling, "I was just so mad that I jumped up and started beating the daylights out of her, like she did to Gold. She struggled and fought, but Crazy Lace and Snowflake here ran over to help me. After that…" Her voice broke off with a crack, indicating that the memory of the event was less than pleasant for her. Snowflake quickly took over, her tone emotionless.

"We shattered her."

Rose looked up at the trio, her eyes widening. Garnet put a hand on her shoulder and shook her head sadly. Pearl reached out to take her hand. The Quartz refused her advances.

"I'm sorry, Rose. We had no other option," said Crazy Lace, "sometimes these things happen in a war. You can't expect to fight an entire empire and not have to take a few lives."

Rose nodded, her mouth pressed into a tight line. It was well-known among the Crystal Gems that she detested the thought of shattering somebody, but it had to be done. This time, she didn't retract her arm when Pearl moved to link theirs together.

Suddenly, Bismuth slammed her fist down on the surface of a table, drawing everyone's attention to her. "This is Pink Diamond's fault!" she roared, her immense strength causing the wooden surface to crack and splinter. "All of our casualties and deaths are her fault! She's the one who colonized this planet to begin with!"

Murmurs of agreement rose from the crowd. Empowered, Bismuth kept speaking. "How much more of us have to die before Homeworld wipes us all out, huh?! They've already killed so many of us, and how many shards do we have on our hands?! Practically none compared to the ones on Pink Diamond's!"

The hums of the crowd became louder as each Gem became more enraged. Bismuth was right. The Diamonds were to blame for this. If it wasn't for that stuck-up pink brat, none of them would have been in this mess.

"It's time we take care of them once and for all!" Bismuth raised a mighty fist in the air, and several others followed suit. Even Garnet joined in, the anger on her face visible despite her visor. Unnoticed, Rose pulled Pearl closer.

"We need to shatter Pink Diamond!"

The rest of the Crystal Gems cheered, some of them standing up. Arms were held up high, flags were waved, swords were unsheathed. The whole room was filled with passionate chanting.

"Rose!" Bismuth turned to her leader suddenly, a wide grin on her face. "Tell me you'll come up with a plan to do it! If anyone can, it's you!" She turned to the army, speaking in a louder voice. "Rose can do it, can't she?!"

The Quartz's face paled as all the attention in the room turned toward her. Nobody cared, too wrapped up in Bismuth's speech to fully take in her expression.

"Rose will shatter Pink Diamond!"

"Rose will free us all!"

"Rose will end all this death and destruction!"

Bismuth raised her arms and began to chant. "Rose Quartz! Rose Quartz! Rose Quartz!"

Everybody joined in, pumping their fists in time with the words. "Rose Quartz! Rose Quartz! Rose Quartz!"

Laughing in exhiliration, Bismuth turned back to the aforementioned Gem, her eyes full of nothing but respect and loyalty. "So, whaddaya say, Rose? Do you think we can do it?"

Rose looked around at all the eyes scrutinizing her with the same devotion that Bismuth held in her own. Pearl squeezed her arm, shooting her a subtle look of panic. Rose took a deep breath, summoning all of her willpower to look as professional as possible. Thankfully, it worked.

"Of course we can."

And then the shouts reached a crescendo, and everyone within reach was slapping her on the back appreciatively, the chanting of her name continuing on and on into the night. Bismuth was chief among those calling it out, a surge of excitement swelling up within her. Deep down, however, her mind was already starting to go to work.

She needed to design a weapon that could effectively shatter a Diamond, after all.


End file.
